institute 2 IEEE Around the World 2 News / 3 Calendar / 5 IEEE History 7 Technology / 8 Annual Election 10 Marketplace of Ideas / 11 President’s Column / 12 Products & Services 13 Conferences / 14 Profile / 16 Part-time Passions / 19 Deadlines & Reminders INSIDE http://www.ieee.org/theinstitute VOL. 33 NO. 2 JUNE 2009 ANNUAL ELECTION Meet the candidates for 2010 IEEE President- Elect: J. Roberto B. de Marca, Moshe Kam, and Joseph V. Lillie. P. 8 PART-TIME PASSIONS A pair of IEEE members from the New York City area keep things rocking. An Alabama duo team up on the ice. P. 16 CONFERENCES Upcoming IEEE conferences focus on the history of societies, automation, ultrasonics, and sensors. P. 13 PRODUCTS & SERVICES IEEE has made it easier to find resources that can help you with your career. P. 12 ONLINE AVAILABLE 8 JUNE AT WWW.IEEE.ORG/THEINSTITUTE PUBLIC VISIBILITY 2007 IEEE President Leah Jamieson offers solutions to the problem of engineer attrition. BOOKS OF INTEREST New Wiley–IEEE Press and Wiley–IEEE Computer Society Press releases.
Transcript
institute 2 IEEE Around the World 2 News / 3 Calendar / 5 IEEE History 7 Technology / 8 Annual Election 10 Marketplace of Ideas / 11 President’s Column / 12 Products & Services 13 Conferences / 14 Profi le / 16 Part-time Passions / 19 Deadlines & Reminders
INSIDEhttp://www.ieee.org/theinstitute VOL. 33 NO. 2 JUNE 2009
ANNUAL ELECTIONMeet the candidates for 2010 IEEE President-Elect: J. Roberto B. de Marca, Moshe Kam, and Joseph V. Lillie. P. 8
PART-TIME PASSIONSA pair of IEEE members from the New York City area keep things rocking. An Alabama duo team up on the ice. P. 16
CONFERENCESUpcoming IEEE conferences focus on the history of societies, automation, ultrasonics, and sensors. P. 13
PRODUCTS & SERVICESIEEE has made it easier to fi nd resources that can help you with your career. P. 12
ONLINEAVAILABLE 8 JUNE AT
WWW.IEEE.ORG/THEINSTITUTE
PUBLIC VISIBILITY 2007 IEEE President Leah Jamieson offers solutions to the problem of
engineer attrition.
BOOKS OF INTEREST New Wiley–IEEE Press
and Wiley–IEEE Computer Society Press releases.
New Wiley–IEEE Press and Wiley–IEEE Computer
Society Press releases.
http://www.ieee.org/theinstitute
A LOOK BACK AT THE HISTORY OF IEEE AND THREE KEY TECHNOLOGIES THAT ITS MEMBERS HELPED DEVELOP. P. 5
Celebrating
125125Years
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NEWSIEEE AROUND THE WORLD
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NEWSIEEE AROUND THE WORLD
■REGION 1: Northeastern U.S. 1. New Hampshire Section
establishes Life Members affi nity group.
■ REGION 2: Eastern U.S. 2. Northern Virginia and
Washington sections establish joint chapter of IEEE Nanotechnology Council.
■REGION 3: Southeastern U.S. and Jamaica
3. Jacksonville (Fla.) Section forms Women in Engineering (WIE) affi nity group.
REGION 4: Central U.S. 4. Southeastern Michigan
Section forms chapter of IEEE Nanotechnology Council.
REGION 5: Southwestern U.S. 5. Kansas City (Mo.) Section
establishes chapter of IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems Society.
REGION 6: Western U.S. 6. San Fernando Valley
(Calif.) Section establishes joint chapter of IEEE
Computer Society and IEEE Communications Society.
REGION 7: Canada 7. Montreal and Boston sections
become sister sections.
REGION 8: Europe, Middle East, and Africa
8. Tunisia Section establishes
chapters of IEEE Circuits and Systems, Signal Processing, Computer, and Computational Intelligence societies.
9. Italy Section establishes chapter of IEEE Systems Council.
10. Benelux Section establishes chapter of IEEE Council on Electronic Design Automation.
11. United Arab Emirates Section establishes chapter of IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society.
REGION 9: Latin America 12. Peru Section establishes chapter
of IEEE Electron Devices Society. 13. WIE affi nity group formed at
Catholic University of Santiago, Guayaquil, Ecuador.
14. Student branch at Nueva Granada Military University, in Bogotá, Colombia, establishes chapters of IEEE Industry Applications Society and IEEE Technology Management Council.
REGION 10: Asia 15. Kansai (Japan) Section
establishes chapter of IEEE Consumer Electronics Society.
16. In India, WIE affi nity groups formed at Vidya Academy of Science and Technology, Thrissur, Kerala, and Dhirubhai Ambani Institute of Information and Communications Technology, Gandhinagar, Gujarat.
17. Also in India, student branches formed at the Institute of Engineering and Technology, Alwar, and the Geetanjali Institute of Technical Studies, Udaipur, Rajasthan.
IEEE AROUND THE WORLDCALENDARIEEE AROUND THE WORLDCALENDAR
2 THE INSTITUTE JUNE 2009
Annual Election Gets Under Way in AugustLook for your annual election ballot package to arrive in August via first-class mail. All eligible members are slated to receive a paper ballot and a postage-paid reply envelope. Included is information about how to access and return the ballot electronically.
New members as of 30 June, as well as those elevated to member or graduate student member on or before that date, may vote.
The usual booklet with the
candidates’ biographies will be mailed only to members who voted by paper ballot in last year’s election and to those who chose to have the booklet mailed to them this
year in their Web account member preference profile. The booklet will not be mailed to new members or to
members who submitted their ballots electronically
last year, did not vote in last year’s election, or updated their Web account preference to not receive a booklet. Please review your contact information, preferences, and education information at http://www.ieee.org/go/ my_account, and update them if
need be to help ensure you receive the ballot package.
Deadlines1 August IEEE annual
election ballots are sent to all voting members by this date.
1 October Last day for members’ ballots to be received by IEEE, by noon Central Daylight Time USA/17:00 UTC.
13 October Last day for Tellers Committee to announce vote tally to IEEE Board of Directors. Unofficial results are reported.
22 November IEEE Board of Directors acts to accept report of Tellers Committee. Annual election results are made official.
E. James “Jim” Prendergast is IEEE’s new executive director. He started on 6 April in Piscataway, N.J., succeeding Jeffry W. Raynes, who resigned last June.
An IEEE senior member, Prender-gast is serving as IEEE’s chief operating officer, managing a staff of more than 1000 employees.
Prior to joining the IEEE staff, he was corporate vice president and chief technology
officer of DuPont Electronic & Communication Technologies, in Wilmington, Del., a leading supplier of electronic materials, fluoro chemicals,
and imaging technologies. Previously, he was vice president and director of Motorola’s Physical Sciences Research Laboratories. Prior to that, he worked for AT&T Bell Labs, where he led the
development, installation, and support of process- and device-modeling tools for silicon and gallium arsenide technologies. He’s been an IEEE member for 32 years.
Explorer 6 satellite conducts the fi rst telecast of
2 3 4 5 6 7 82 3 4 5 6 7 8
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06.2009IEEE HISTORY
IEEE HISTORYTECHNOLOGYANNUAL ELECTION
JUNE 2009 THE INSTITUTE 5
ON 13 MAY 1884 in New York City, a small group of electricity pioneers met to form the American Institute of Electrical Engineers. From its very start the AIEE had a lofty goal: to support the advancement of electrical
technologies to improve people’s lives. As electric power spread to all parts of the world—enhanced by large-scale power plants and inventions such as AIEE Member Nikola Tesla’s ac induction motor—the organization’s founders wanted its members to be at the forefront of whatever tech-nologies emerged. In addition to electric power, the organi-zation focused on wired communication tools such as the telegraph and the telephone.
Little could the founders—who included Thomas A. Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, and Norvin Green, presi-dent of Western Union Telegraph—have foreseen that they had sown the seeds for what is now the world’s largest tech-nical professional association.
This year IEEE celebrates the 125th anniversary of that New York City meeting. The AIEE merged in 1963 with the Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE)—which was founded in 1912 to deal with the up-and-coming fi eld of radio—to form
IEEE. Although much has changed over the years, one thing remains the same: IEEE retains the ambitious goal of fos-tering technological innovation and excellence for the ben-efi t of humanity. As we look to the future, the IEEE History Center helped The Institute remember the important events marking the path taken by IEEE to become what it is today.
The AIEE held its fi rst technical meeting in October 1884 in Philadelphia. Green was the AIEE’s fi rst president. Other notable presidents were Bell (1891–1892); Charles Proteus Steinmetz (1901–1902), who fostered the development of ac power; and Schuyler S. Wheeler (1905–1906), inventor of the two-blade electric fan.
Disseminating information among its members through technical meetings, standards, and publications was the primary way the AIEE went about its work. Accordingly, the organization had stringent procedures for approving papers for its three technical publications.
That wasn’t the AIEE’s only strict criteria. Its membership requirements recognized degrees only from the universi-ties accredited by the Engineering Council for Professional Development, including Cornell, MIT, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Looking Back 125 Years BY ANNA BOGDANOWICZ
Editor’s note: To celebrate the 125th anniversary of the founding of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers on 13 May 1884, The Institute dedicates this issue to those who set IEEE on the path of becoming what it is today: the world’s largest technical professional association.
We explore IEEE’s development in “Looking Back 125 Years,” (this page). In “Tracking Tech History,” p. 7, we offer a brief look at three key technologies in which IEEE members played starring roles.
—Kathy Kowalenko
1. Norvin Green. 2. AIEE logo. 3. Lee de Forest. 4. Alfred Goldsmith. 5. Charles Steinmetz. 6. Nikola Tesla. 7. The telegraph. 8. Thomas A. Edison. 9. Frederick E. Terman. 10. An early radio. 11. Alexander Graham Bell. 12. IRE logo. 13. Patrick E. Haggerty. 14. Gugielmo Marconi. 15. An early telephone.
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RADIO IS BORN At the turn of the century, a new industry arose out of IRE Honorary Member Guglielmo Marconi’s wireless telegraphy exper-iments. What was originally called wireless became known as radio in some parts of the world. The technology was advanced by the elec-trical amplification possibilities of the vacuum tubes that evolved from John Fleming’s diode and IRE and AIEE Member Lee de Forest’s triode.
To focus on those technologies, a group of radio pioneers, including Alfred Goldsmith, inventor of the first commercial radio with two control knobs and a built-in speaker, established IRE in 1912 in New York City. Robert H. Marriott, who worked for the American Marconi Co., was its f irst president. The association was mod-eled on the AIEE, but it had a more international approach that included selecting officers from outside the United States. The IRE mission was
“the advancement of the theory and practice of radio engineering and of the allied arts and sci-ences and the maintenance of high professional standing among its members.”
Notable presidents included Goldsmit h (1928), Frederick E. Terman (1941), and Patrick E. Haggerty (1962). The IRE’s own list of “schools of recognized sciences” to qualify members included far more institutions than those rec-ognized by the AIEE. The IRE’s flagship techni-cal publication, Proceedings of the IRE, became well respected in the technical community for its timely peer-reviewed articles. Transactions of the
AIEE was also well respected, but it was slower to publish papers because it printed them only after they’d been presented at an AIEE meeting.
PLAYING CATCH-UP IRE lagged behind the older organization in membership for many years. It wasn’t until after World War II that com-petition between the two organizations for mem-bers heated up. In 1947, the AIEE had almost 35 500 members, compared with the IRE’s 21 000. By 1956, each society had about 50 000, and by the time of the merger, the IRE was far larger.
With the rise of electronics, the sharp distinc-tion between the two societies’ areas of interest blurred, leading to serious talks about a merger in 1961. The AIEE-IRE Merger Committee was formed to explore the challenges of uniting the two soci-eties, both of which had student branches. Both shared a common objective—serving members—but there were hurdles to overcome.
It was a basic tenet that AIEE members—each one an electrical engineer—apply their scientific knowledge to serve humanity. The IRE did not have such a mission; it was more focused on theory. And unlike the AIEE, the IRE welcomed physicists, chemists, and others from related sci-entific disciplines, provided they were working in radio or electronics-related fields.
Two factors helped fuel the merger: the IRE’s successful system of technical professional groups, and the growing numbers of students involved with joint AIEE-IRE student branches at
U.S. universities. In effect, the students merged before the societies did.
The IRE’s technical groups helped keep mem-bers informed about established and emerging fields. By 1955, there were 21 such groups; today all continue as IEEE societies.
College students had gotten a jump on the organizations’ eventual merger because each association levied separate membership dues, and the generally penurious students wanted a more affordable way to participate in AIEE and IRE activities. In 1950 the AIEE and the IRE autho-rized colleges to establish joint student branches to which a member of either society could belong. By 1962, there were 130 joint student branches. Today IEEE has almost 1700 student branches.
TAKING A VOTE Also in 1962, merger talks between the two societies had gotten serious, and in the March 1962 issue of the Proceedings of the IRE, members were asked to vote on the merger. Articles in the issue explored the logistics of the 95 500-member IRE merging with the 57 000-member AIEE. (Nearly 20 000 people belonged to both societies.) AIEE members were also asked to vote.
AIEE and IRE formally merged in 1963. More than 60 percent of all eligible members voted, and 87 percent cast ballots favoring the merger. Today IEEE boasts 382 400 members, 324 sec-tions in 10 geographic regions around the world, 38 societies, and 7 technical councils. n
IEEE HIstory
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IEEE’s 125th annivErsary is intended not only to honor engineering’s past but also to celebrate its future. here we look at three tech-nologies iEEE members have been involved with that have had a glorious past and still
promise a shining future: the telephone, the inte-grated circuit, and the internet.
MOBILITY RULES Who doesn’t like mobile phones? But from 1946—when mobile telephone service (Mts) was introduced—until the mid-1980s—when cellular phones went into wide com-mercial use—only the wealthy could afford them. the Mts system was not sophisticated, having only a dozen two-way channels. and because it could not reuse frequencies within a metropolitan area, it served relatively few. the system covered its area from a single high-power base station, with each call taking up an entire channel.
today, thanks to the cellular concept with its multiple low-power base stations and much broader frequency allocation, nearly everyone has a cellphone. some developing countries might even skip installing landlines altogether and move right to cellphones.
as cellphones became more popular, they gained features not traditionally associated with telephony. in fact, making a phone call seems almost a side issue today when you consider the number of functions provided by so-called smart-phones. Basically, the tiny tykes are computers built on an open-source operating system. their many applications come from the phone manu-facturer, the network operator, and third-party software developers. applications include e-mail, Web browsing, and the ability to take, display, and transmit photos. Users can play games, listen to music, watch videos, and read documents. some phones include a GPs receiver—which is leading to a variety of location-based services, from sim-ply finding an address to locating a movie theater or restaurant. Certainly, alexander Graham Bell, the 1891–1892 president of the american institute of Electrical Engineers, wouldn’t know what to do first. Who can tell what else the future will bring?
FROM PLANAR TO 3-D a manufacturing inno-vation, underappreciated at first, is behind the iC revolution that has driven the electronics indus-try for the past 30 years or so. the planar process covered sensitive silicon p-n junctions with a pro-tective layer of silicon dioxide to guard against contamination, a source in some transistors of amplification instability. the immediate result was better transistors.
But that flat oxide layer also turned out to be an excellent substrate for depositing metal traces for interconnecting other components fabricated on the same piece of silicon. thus the modern iC
was born. in the early days, a typical iC, cut from a 50-millimeter-diameter silicon wafer, held a few dozen transistors. today’s iCs, fabricated on 300-mm wafers, can hold more than a billion.
the history of iC development is a series of vic-tories over problems that arose as transistors kept shrinking. the number of transistors per chip has grown exponentially, doubling about every 18 months, following Moore’s Law. Many times
since Gordon Moore, an iEEE Life Fellow, first described the phenomenon in 1965, problems threatened to end the law’s predictive sway. Most recently, two related issues were a threat: Chips had to dissipate too much power and signal trans-mission delays were too long. But chip designers solved those problems, and the validity of Moore’s Law is poised to extend into the future.
the power problem was solved by gating off parts of the chip circuit that weren’t being used at a particular time. and signal delays were trimmed by making chip interconnect lines shorter—with three-dimensional wiring that replaces long hor-izontal interconnects with short vertical ones, a technique described in February at the iEEE international solid-state Circuits Conference. the technique involves stacking planar devices and interconnecting them with metal placed in through-silicon vias, or holes. (through-hole
vias have been used for years on dense printed circuit boards.) Other benefits of the construc-tion include the ability to integrate in a single device circuit layers made of different—even incompatible—processes; to pack more functions into a given footprint; and to make it difficult to copy a device by reverse-engineering it.
THE INTERNET Beginning life as the arPanEt in the 1960s, the internet was meant to allow scien-tists funded by the U.s. Department of Defense to run programs on widely separated comput-ers and to share software. its designers chose to implement the new network with then-untried packet-switching technology, which could carry data more efficiently than conventional circuit switching could.
Packet switching had been conceived a few years earlier, not in search of efficiency but for its efficacy in moving information across a dis-tributed data network then being developed for the U.s. military. the network, which was never built, was to have had a distributed architecture to ensure that it could survive an enemy attack. this architecture, inspired by Cold War military concerns, became the internet’s bedrock.
But another factor, also of military origin, was perhaps even more important. realizing that mil-itary field operations often relied on radio—and, increasingly, satellite—communications, the Department of Defense’s advanced research Project agency (then referred to as arPa, and now as DarPa) built a pair of packet-radio networks: the terrestrial PrnEt and the satellite-based satnEt. it quickly became clear that the two net-works had to be connected. From the effort to link the dissimilar packet networks came most of the key ideas behind today’s internet, including the multilayered protocol stack in which computers at the end points of a communication path, rather than the network, take on responsibility for com-munications reliability.
the internet has grown enormously in the decades since its birth, but its basic structure has remained unchanged. it has incorporated tech-nical advances from other fields, including fiber-optic cables and other components, advanced computers, and faster semiconductors.
By far the internet’s most important applica-tion is the World Wide Web. timothy Berners-Lee, the 2008 iEEE/rsE Wolfson James Clerk Maxwell award recipient, developed the foundation for the Web while at the European Organization for Particle research (CErn) near Geneva. Once the public realized what the Web could do, the internet took its final step in moving from mili-tary project to the specialists’ tool to everyone’s principal communications medium.
recently, marketers heralded the arrival of Web 2.0 as a way of describing the internet’s latest capabilities compared with what’s now retrospectively called Web 1.0. Web 2.0 fosters innovation by making it easier for anyone to cre-ate Web sites and services by combining existing features. to learn the direction Web 2.0 will be taking, stay tuned. n
—Compiled with the help of the IEEE History Center
teCHnoloGy
Tracking Tech History a look at the evolution of three critical innovations BY MICHAEL J. RIEZENMAN
Clockwise from top: Geographic map of the ARPANET; Fairchild Semiconductor’s first commercial planar transistor ; Motorola’s Razr cellphone on top of the company’s first cellphone, a DynaTAC 8000X.
June 2009 tHe institute �
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Why did you go into engineering? de Marca Primarily because of my father, who was a civil engineer and owned a construction company. However, I soon realized I was attracted to modern technology fields—eventually my choice was telecommunications—that relied more heavily on math.KaM There are two reasons. The first is ideology. My family strongly encouraged me to work in a productive field such as engineering or manufacturing. The second reason is individual taste. Since an early age I have been fascinated with radio and radar, which I saw at my father’s workplace. I knew I wanted to play with those magic boxes when I grew up. I still do.LiLLie When I was a child I went on service calls with my dad, who was an electrician and an appliance repairman. I’ve always been amazed at how things work. Studying engineering was a way to learn how to figure things out.
Favorite chiLdhood MeMory? de Marca Braving the high waves and bodysurfing at Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro. My parents were very anxious for me to be on safe land again.KaM Seeing the painting The Great Last Judgment for the first time. My parents took me to Munich one summer and left me for a few hours to wander around the Alte Pinakothek museum. I sat in front of this monumental painting of Rubens for more than an hour trying to understand it.LiLLie Building things. I have three brothers and three sisters. The seven of us would tear apart junk appliances such as washing machines and refrigerators and build toys out of them. It was like playing with a
giant erector set. The best thing we built was a go-kart. The neighbors were amazed.
hoW WouLd you describe your personaLity?LiLLie Outgoing.de Marca An excellent observer, persistent, with firm opinions but willing to listen (and I am very good at it, too). KaM Very focused and deter-mined, yet deliberative and patient.
What are your hobbies? LiLLie I collect various items of the three wise monkeys: hear no evil, see no evil, and speak no evil. I have almost 800. KaM Visiting art museums and church treasury museums. I recently spent two days at the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg. Two years ago I spent two weeks in the treasuries of historical churches in Portugal.de Marca My most time-consuming and gratifying hobby is being an IEEE volunteer, but I also enjoy walks on the beach, watching sports, and going to concerts.
iF you Were stranded on an isLand, What one thing WouLd you Want to have With you?KaM A solar-powered iPhone with truckloads of good books stored in its memory, including the Bible, Homer, Dream of the Red Chamber,
Dead Souls, and To Kill a Mockingbird.LiLLie A solar-powered laptop with Internet access.de Marca I’m assuming that I am stranded alone and that the island has no electric power, so I would have to give priority to survival. I would like to have a Crocodile Dundee–size knife.
Favorite type oF FoodLiLLie Anything with Tabasco.de Marca Italian—I guess everybody in IEEE knows that.
� the institute June 2009
president‑elect candidates: an insider’s LookBY ANNA BOGDANOWICZ
WITH THE AnnuAl IEEE election coming up in August, it’s time to get to know the candidates for 2010 President-Elect: J. Roberto B. de Marca, Moshe Kam, and Joseph V. lillie. To help acquaint readers with the three, The Institute explored their personal sides.
We’ll cover their positions on important IEEE issues in our annual coverage of the Candidates night Q&A in the September issue.
De Marca, an IEEE Fellow, has been a faculty member since 1978 at Catholic university in Rio de Janeiro, where he has held several leadership and administrative positions, including associate academic vice president. He is the founding president of the Brazilian Telecommunications Society and a member of the Brazilian national Academy of Sciences. He has held various visiting positions at universities and industrial laboratories in Asia, Europe, and north America. He served as 2008 vice president of IEEE Technical Activities.
Kam heads the electrical and computer engineering department at Drexel university, in Philadelphia. An IEEE Fellow, he has taught and conducted research in detection and estimation, robotics, and control at Drexel since 1986. lockheed Martin, Motorola, and Honeywell have supported his research, as have the u.S. national Science Foundation, the Office of naval Research, the naval Surface Warfare Center, DARPA, and the Army Communications–Electronics Research, Development, and Engineering Center. He founded and directs the university’s Data Fusion laboratory, and he heads its Center for Excellence in Information Assurance Education. He was vice president of IEEE Educational Activities from 2005 to 2007 and currently serves as a member of the ABET board of directors.
Lillie, a senior member, has 35 years of experience in telecommunications engineering and management. He held several positions at BellSouth Telecommunications facilities throughout louisiana from 1973 to 2002, including design engineer, planner, district support manager, engineering manager, and planning manager. When he retired in 2002 from BellSouth he was a member of the louisiana BellSouth State Staff providing engineering and construction support in louisiana. In 2003 he joined northStar Communications Group of Birmingham, Ala., as director of corporate quality, and in 2005 he returned to BellSouth (now AT&T) to work on restoration projects following Hurricane Katrina. He continues to provide engineering support to AT&T in louisiana on a part-time basis. He has held various IEEE positions, including 2008 and 2009 vice president of Member and Geographic Activities and director of the IEEE Foundation.
Kam Vegetarian massaman curry [above] as prepared by the Sawadee Thai Restaurant in Salt Lake City.
most important engineering breaKthrough of the past 125 years?LiLLie The computer. De marca IEEE volunteers do a lot of traveling and spend a substantial amount of time using e-mail. These activities are related to two of my favorite engineering accomplishments that have dramatically changed how we live and do business: commercial aviation and the Internet (and its underlying worldwide tele-communications infrastructure). Since I had to pick one, I chose commercial aviation. The diversity of engineering fields that gave contributions to the current level of commercial aviation is amazing: mechanics, electronics, materials, logistics, reliability, etc.
Kam The alternating-current transformer by William Stanley Jr. in 1884. This technology allowed mass urban—and then rural—electrification, and it led to great improvements worldwide in human welfare, health, and economic well-being.
favorite movieDe marca The Man Who Knew Too Much (when I was a child I was a Doris Day fan). Although if I were allowed to name a second movie, it would be Gladiator.Kam Rashômon [below]. I must have seen it 50 times.LiLLie Serendipity.
Why DiD you join ieee?LiLLie When I was an under-graduate student I noticed a sign in the engineering building that announced the IEEE student branch was taking a trip to the Houston Space Center, a five-hour drive. You had to be a member
to go, so I signed up. I think the dues were US $15. It was the best $15 I ever spent.De marca When I was an undergraduate, my professors intro-
duced me to IEEE publications, and
I was profoundly impressed by
the caliber of the authors and editors. I decided I should join the organization that was able to attract so many lumi-naries. That was 38 years ago. Now I am extremely proud to be an IEEE Fellow and running for the highest office of the same organization I was in awe of as a young man.Kam I joined IEEE just as soon as I was admitted to become an elec-trical engineering student. I held the simple belief that every profes-sional must belong to the profes-sional society that corresponds to his or her field of interest. It was the most natural and straightforward thing to do. I believed in this when I was 16, and I believe in this now.
first jobLiLLie I’ve been told that I worked with my dad since I was able to walk, but my first real job was when I was 12. I sold candy at a movie theater and ran the projector.
De marca Preparing the weekly payroll envelopes at my father’s construction company. I was probably 10 years old when I started. My compensation was not much, but I felt very important.Kam I was given the specifications to build a strobe light for an aircraft from scratch and get it to flash reliably. I was given three weeks and all the money I needed for parts. The deadline was 8 a.m. on a Tuesday, and it finally started flashing properly at 7:45 that morning.
most memorabLe career moment?LiLLie In 1982 I was part of a team of what was then South Central Bell that deployed the first fiber-optic cable in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Kentucky, and Tennessee. We used the new fiber-optic technology to solve a problem that traditional technology could not. We didn’t know much about fiber optics at the time, other than that the cables were very small. Of course, now the technology is used all over the place.Kam As an entry-level communications engineer, I solved a technical problem that allowed about 50 of my colleagues to move from a very hazardous work environment to work remotely in a safe location. The solution I developed was not groundbreaking; it was a straightforward application of a textbook formula. Still, I was in awe of the indirect impact the formula had on the well-being of so many people. Suddenly engineering had a human face, and all the stuff I had read for school had a totally different purpose. I was glad I had paid attention.De marca Being elected president of the IEEE Communications Society in 2000.
What’s something others might not KnoW about you?De marca I collect art.Kam I sing choral music. I was a second bass with the Philadelphia
Choral Society in the 1990s, and now I sing with the Mendelssohn Club of Philadelphia.LiLLie I was named
the 1989 International Cajun Joke Telling Contest champion. The competition is an annual event in Louisiana. Contestants are each given 10 minutes to present good, clean, Cajun humor.
if you couLD have Dinner With one person, DeaD or aLive, Who WouLD it be?Kam Helen Suzman—the South African anti-apartheid activist and politician and one of the most courageous women to have ever lived. I met her once but unfortunately will not have the opportunity to dine with her again. She died this year. I miss her.De marca Given this very special opportunity by The Institute, I called a favorite restaurant and tried to reserve a table for three.
The guests I had in mind were a Brit whose first name was Winston and an Italian born a few centuries ago in the city of Vinci. However, the restaurant had strict no-smoking rules, so I decided to go for a party of two and focus my undivided attention on the amazing personality and genius
of Signore Leonardo.LiLLie Neil Armstrong. I’ve always been fascinated with space exploration. When I was a kid the space program was just getting started, and I was glued to the TV. n
correctionsJoseph V. lillie worked for Bellsouth telecommunications in facilities throughout louisiana, not in san antonio [“three to Vie for 2010 Ieee president-elect,” March, p. 4].
the five new officers elected to the Board of directors join 26, not 27, colleagues on the Board [“five Named to Board of directors,” p. 4].
the Ieee region 8 meeting was held in Venice, not london [calendar, p. 5].
responses to March’s Question
engineering the futureEarlier this year, IEEE members chose dozens of engineering breakthroughs they regarded as No. 1—including the transistor, electric power, and the Internet—since IEEE’s birth 125 years ago. In March we looked to the future. Experts and science-fiction writers have suggested that the next century could witness technology for controlling the weather, unlimited renewable energy, a space elevator, and the oft-predicted teleportation of human beings and the flying car.
What do you see as the top engineering breakthrough in the next 125 years?
nuclear fusionI look forward to a practical, limitless, nonpolluting fusionpower capability. We could then eliminate or manage global warming and support limitless population growth with milehigh buildings. We a lso could pipe desa linated ocean water any where to ma ke even the deserts bloom, launch hazardous nuclear waste to the sun, and avoid war because everybody would have enough of everything.
We should continue with other nations to fund an international ef fort to develop f usion energ y, recognizing that it will probably take 50 to 100 years to make this technolog y a rea l it y. Our greatgreatgrandchildren will need it.
Maybe the prospect of fusion
power and the result ing wealth will also help us avoid a nuclear showdown.
Jim BallSunnyvale, Calif.
overlapping themeI n t he pa s t , mo s t i n nov at ion resulted from the convergence of various technologies and scientific discoveries, especially in the fields of electricity, energ y, and material science. Planes, cars, computers, and even nuclear weapons are apt examples. Fields such as biology, information sciences, and the humanmachine interface also will be combined to create technologies that work with a collection of societal, industrial, and possibly ecological grids.
In the future, the expansion and convergence of different technologies will accelerate.
RoB CayzeRBukit Jalil, malaysia
Genes and space flight A medical discovery in the understanding of biological processes
wou ld a l low doctors to reprog ra m a huma n body to combat disease, cure allergies, and strengthen muscles.
Sadly, it probably will take a war to push scientists and engineers to come up with a
breakthrough to defend against a biological attack.
A more l ikely brea kt hrough would be in the area of space propulsion. I also foresee the development of a regenerative fuel system that makes it possible to sustain a colony on the moon.
Kent HaRRiSlouisville, Ky.
cosmological approach A very large, lowcostpersquaremeter, spacebased solar col lection system with efficient energy transfer back to Earth. The atmosphere blocking the sunlight would then not be a problem, and there would be no concern about using up real estate.
miCHael KoRannorton, mass.
free for allAn openspectrumaccess policy. The logical culmination of the current work being done on dynamic
spectr um access and cognit ive radio has the potential to create an Internet in the sky. We would finally have freedom to transmit what data we want, where we want it, and how we want it.
niKHil KundaRgiminneapolis
shifting GenesBio and genetic engineering. Since the dawn of agriculture, man has domesticated plants and animals, thus leading to an enormous population increase.
However, traditional methods of bioengineering are slow and require generat ions to develop modified organisms. With a full understanding of the genetic mechanisms of life, humans will be able to design and engineer organisms to suit their needs. Organical ly grown products will replace manmade or manmodified products, and there will be a shift from the use of inorganic materia ls such as meta ls a nd si l icon to grow n carbonbased materials.
gunnaR maeHlumoslo
energy efficiency T he f ield of i nex pen sive h ig hef f ic ienc y photovolt a ic s c ombined with an enhanced electric grid will be the top breakthrough in energy.
In the environment, the ability to use robotic elements to sort refuse and recycle will lower our dependence on raw materials and nonrenewable energy.
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proof 3 24 hr Turnaround requireddate 05/01/09 tiMe 1:55 pm
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respond To This quesTionby e-mail or regular mail. Space may not permit publication of all responses,
but we’ll try to draw a representative sample. Responses will appear in the September issue of The Institute and may be edited for brevity.
Suggestions for questions are welcome.
this Month’s Question
is Your Job secure?News outlets in recent months have reported that IBM, hp, Microsoft, panasonic, Nokia, and other high-tech companies laid off thousands of employees. But some observers call those reports exaggerated. one tech news publication wrote that layoff figures are deceptive because most refer to the elimination of already vacant positions or ones that are new and as yet unfilled. What’s more, some engineers are in demand, such as those needed for smart power grids, alternative energy, and other green projects.
Just how secure do You feel about Your Job?
Mail: The Institute, Ieee operations center, 445 hoes lane, piscataway, NJ 08854-4141 usa fax: +1 732 562 1746 e-Mail: [email protected]
6p.Marketplace.lo.indd 10 5/8/09 1:03:14 PM
president’s column
www.ieee.org/theinstitute
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June 2009 the institute 11
So, who runs IEEE? The volunteers do, of course. The Board of Directors con-sists of volunteers, and our
journals, conferences, standards, and educational activit ies are all run by volunteers. sure, IEEE employs about 1000 staff mem-bers, who bring needed business and professional skills, but major decisions are made by volunteers. without volunteers, IEEE could not be the “leading professional association for the advancement of technology.”
A few months ago, I asked a fellow IEEE director to guess how many vol-unteers contribute to IEEE in a year. he answered, “Maybe 7000 to 8000?” My hunch was that the number was much higher, so I did a “back of the envelope” calculation and came up with 800 000 volunteers. The result astounded me. since then, I’ve shown various “experts” my calculation. no one has yet found a flaw in it.
here’s the arithmetic:I E E E publ i she d more t ha n
30 000 journal articles last year. Assuming a 50 percent acceptance rate and an average of five volunteers working on a single article—authors, r e v ie wer s , a nd e d itor s — t hen 300 000-plus volunteers must have contributed (some may have contrib-uted more than once, but we’ll cor-rect for that later).
A not her 300 000 volunteers authored, reviewed, and processed the approximately 140 000 confer-ence articles published in 2008.
It took an average of more than 100 volunteers to organize each of the 900-plus conferences held last year—y ielding anot her 100 000 volunteers.
nea rly 40 0 0 orga n i zat iona l units—sections, chapters, student branches, societies, councils, and standards working groups—have at least 25 volunteers each. That yields another 100 000.
The total comes to 800 000 volun-teers! But if each volunteer handles two assignments on average, and if my estimates are too high by a fac-tor of two, there are 200 000 people volunteering for IEEE each year, still an incredible number. (Many volun-teers are not IEEE members, but that is a topic for a future column.)
w hat mot ivates IEEE volun-teers? The answer lies partly in the
first-ever research of volunteerism in u.s.-based associations, done in 2007. The research—“The Decision to Volunteer”—was conducted by the American society of Association E xecut ives a nd t he Center for Association Leadership. It surveyed more than 26 000 volunteers, includ-ing IEEE members.
The most cited reason for volun-teering, according to the survey, is
“helping others and creating a bet-ter society.” That’s powerful moti-vation and a primary reason why,
for 125 years, volunteers have been helping IEEE and its predecessor societies foster “technological inno-vation and excellence for the benefit of humanity.”
Many volunteers surveyed also see their work as making them better professionals. For example, in IEEE they can gain leadership and orga-nizational skills and the chance to network with the best from around the world. And volunteers’ wil l-ingness to help the profession and humanity also gives them a sense of achievement. I know many consider the chance to volunteer for IEEE as a member benefit, and my personal observations are that the typical IEEE volunteer is enthusiastic, ener-getic, and passionate. Volunteers work diligently on behalf of others without being motivated by finan-cial or material gain.
Finding meaningf ul ways to involve young professiona ls is important, the research pointed out. Participating in the IEEE Graduates of the Last Decade (GoLD) program, with its thousands of members, is an excellent way to engage younger members’ volunteering. one place for them to begin is on committees, where they can network with more
seasoned volunteers. “Low profile” volunteering such
as mentoring, membership recruit-ing, and writing articles for publica-tion needs as much recognition as serving on boards and committees, the study found. There are tens of thousands of IEEE volunteers work-ing in those areas.
Finally, there is also an unintended benefit to volunteering: Volunteers live longer and healthier lives. “The health Benefits of Volunteering: A review of recent research,” pub-
lished in 2007 by the u.s. Corporation for national and Community service, summarized the findings from mul-tiple reports during the past two decades. The studies found many correlations between volunteering and well-being. one study found that, in general, “volunteers report greater life satisfaction and better physical health than do non-volunteers, and their life satisfaction and physical health improve at a greater rate as a result of volunteering.”
The poet ralph waldo Emerson expressed the benefits of volunteer-ing aptly: “It is one of the beautiful compensations of life that no man can sincerely help another without helping himself.”
For those of you who have volun-teered or are volunteering now, a big thank you! For others, what would inspire you to volunteer for IEEE? send me your ideas and any other comments to [email protected].
Editorial Advisory Board Ziauddin ahmed, James anderson,
Jon rokne (Vice president, ieee publication services & products),
anthony durniak (ieee staff executive, publications), abhi Gupta,
Brian harrington, susan hassler (editor, IEEE Spectrum), eric holdrinet,
phillip laplante, nita patel, sandra robinson, and Karl Varian
IEEE MEDIA Publisher James a. Vick
Associate Publisher Sales & Advertising Director
marion delaney
Business Manager robert t. ross
Marketing & Promotion Manager Blanche mcGurr
Advertising Sales +1 212 419 7760
Advertising Production Manager felicia spagnoli
Advertising Production +1 732 562 6334
Without volunteers, IEEE could not be the
“leading professional association for the advancement of technology.”
6p.Presidents.lo.indd 11 5/6/09 3:16:47 PM
Benefits
www.ieee.org/theinstitute
ieee Quick Guide
products & servicesconferences
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12 the InStItute June 2009
the ieee contact centerVisit http://www.ieee.org/contactcenter for assistance with membership and nonmembership products and services and help with publication delivery.
For e-mail inquiries, the Contact Center is open from 4:30 p.m. ET (20:30 GMT) Sunday to 4:30 p.m. Friday.
To speak to a Contact Center representative, call: Tel: +1 800 678 4333 (U.S. and Canada) Tel: +1 732 981 0060 (worldwide) Fax: +1 732 562 6380
Business hours: 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET (12:00 to 21:00 GMT), Monday through Friday
To renew membership: http://www.ieee.org/contactcenter
To update your profile: http://www.ieee.org/web/membership/join/update_profile.html
contact pointsIEEE Operations Center 445 Hoes Lane Piscataway, NJ 08854-4141 USA Tel: +1 732 981 0060
IEEE Corporate Office (New York) Tel: +1 212 419 7900
ieee career sitehttp://www.ieee.org/web/careers/home
finding Ieee services that can help you land a job or improve your skills just got a little easier. the Careers section of the Ieee Web site now lists 29 employment-related resources, including job listings, career advice, continuing-education programs, and networking opportunities.
“our career and employment assistance services are probably Ieee’s best-kept secrets, and most of them are free,” says Senior member Jean eason, chair of the ad hoc Ieee Career Services Committee.although many of the services have been set up by Ieee-uSa, they’re all available to every member.
you don’t have to go through the entire list to find what you need. two filters help narrow the resources into categories. the Life Cycle filter sorts according to what stage you are in your career—a recent graduate, say, or in the late stages. the Benefits Category filter zeroes in on services for career enhancement, education, employment, or networking.
here’s a sample of what is available.
JoB huntinGIEEE Job Site. matches your skills with online job listings. Create a personal profile, and the site will e-mail you when a job listing matches your criteria.IEEE Student Job Site. Leads college students and recent grads to entry-level jobs, internships, and other opportunities. view help-wanted listings, job fairs, and other announcements posted by employers, Ieee student branches, and the afterCollege
job network, which collects openings from its own national listings and from the Ieee Job Site.Employment Navigator. Collects roughly 5 million leads from some 100 000 Web sites with job openings, and puts them in a searchable database. the information comes from corporate Web sites and job boards, as well as from job sites dealing with a particular industry, occupation, or geographic area.
Salary Service. Compares what you’re earning, or what you’re being offered, to what others are getting in similar circumstances.
career adviceCareer Navigator. a career and job-search tool set for managing job transitions throughout one’s career. It can manage network relationships and the complexities of a job search, as well as organize key career information such as résumés and reference letters.Career Webinars. offer advice for finding your next job, negotiating a salary, and understanding workplace ethics, as well as other helpful strategies.Career Alert. Weekly e-mail newsletter publishes articles on jobs, education, management,
and the engineering workplace culled from various news sources and compiled by IEEE Spectrum editors.
continuinG educationIEEE Expert Now. offers interactive courses based on tutorials and workshops presented at Ieee conferences around the world. Courses have been developed by experts in a wide range of engineering technologies, including computer engineering, power systems, biometrics, and vehicular technology.Career Enhancement Courses. teaches the soft skills needed for success in today’s workplace. topics include Giving and receiving Constructive feedback, managing your priorities, and proactive Listening. Education Partners Program.
offers online degree programs, certifications, and courses at up to a 10 percent discount from universities and educational organizations including drexel university, purdue university, and Inquestra Learning.
netWorKinG opportunities
Employment & Career Strategies Community. enables members to network and collaborate with one another on employment and career strategies.IEEE Consultants’ Network. an alliance of groups in Canada, India, mexico, pakistan, and the united States offers opportunities for members who are consultants to meet and learn from each other while promoting their availability to local businesses. the popular Consultants database matches consultants with prospective clients.IEEE-USA Entrepreneurs Village. discussion forum brings together entrepreneurs and those thinking about starting a business. topics deal with issues that arise from running and growing a small business, including best practices concerning organizational and legal issues, finance, venture capital, marketing, and human resources. n
one-stop shopping for career helpBY KATHY KOWALENKO
6p.Prod&Serv2009.lo.indd 12 5/6/09 3:11:49 PM
www.ieee.org/theinstitute
Continuing education. The way it should be.
Unlock your potential with IEEE Educational Activities—one of the most comprehensive continuing education resources you’ll fi nd anywhere.
IEEE Educational Activities off ers you a proven array of
programs designed especially for technology professionals—
IEEE Expert Now Online Education Courses, IEEE Education
Partners Program, Continuing Education Units and more,
providing value-added benefi ts to your membership.
Whatever your goals, you can customize your continuing
education the way you want at www.ieee.org/education.
Find your way: www.ieee.org/education
09-EA-0044-ED-Activities-Ads-Final.indd 1 4/30/09 10:02:28 AM
IEEE Conference on Automation Science and Engineering Bangalore, India 22–25 August
Covers principal key areas: research; knowledge sciences and
automation; sensors and sensor networks; manufacturing, logistics, and supply-chain management; life-sciences and health-care automation; and meso-, micro-, and nanoscale automation.SPONSOR: IEEE Robotics and Automation SocietyVISIT: http://www.ieee-case.org
IEEE International Ultrasonics Symposium Rome 20–23 September
Topics include medical ultrasonics, sensors, nondestructive evaluation,
industrial applications, physical acoustics, MEMS, and transducers
and transducer materials. Several short presentations on the latest research in ultrasonics are scheduled.SPONSOR: IEEE Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control SocietyVISIT: http://www.ewh.ieee.org/conf/ius_2009
IEEE Sensors Christchurch, New Zealand 25–28 October
Topics include chemical and gas sensors; biosensors; optical, mechanical,
and physical sensors; sensor/actuator systems; and networks.SPONSOR: IEEE Sensors CouncilVISIT: http://www.ieee-sensors 2009.org
ConFEREnCES AUg–oCT
IEEE Conference on the History of Technical SocietiesPhiladelphia, 5–7 AugustThis year’s conference, organized by the IEEE History Center and the IEEE History Committee, celebrates IEEE’s 125th anniversary by tracing the origins and development of professional technical associations worldwide. one theme is the role of professional groups in shaping technological advances and their contributions to society. Discussions of the history of IEEE and its technical societies are included. The conference is being held in Philadelphia to commemorate the founding meeting of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, one of IEEE’s two predecessor societies.SPONSORS: IEEE Philadelphia Section, Drexel University, and the University of Pennsylvania VISIT: http://www.ieee.org/go/historyconference
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peopleprofile
Sometimes cutting-edge engineer-ing has as much to do with making technology happen in near-impossible condit ions as it does w ith building something completely new. Last year,
member gertjan van stam transfixed an ieee audience in Boston with tales of helping to build an information highway in the remote south Zambian village of macha.
As ceo of Linknet Zambia in macha, van stam helped bui ld the f irst rura l Zambian internet cooperative, whereby users share costs of a local internet connection and wireless infra-structure and maintenance.
input first He told 115 attendees in october at the first ieee Humanitarian Workshop that instead of riding into town and announcing, “this is what needs to be done,” he asks residents for their input. “the challenge is to find local talent, learn how they wish to improve their community, and then train and assist them in a community-driven solution,” he says.
the landlocked southern African nation of Zambia is among the world’s poorest, with a per-
capita annual income of us $800. many residents live on $1 per day. compare that to the cost of internet connectivity in the area: $1300 per month for a 128-kilobyte-per-second connection shared by the villagers. Van stam helped set up the ini-tial infrastructure with $50 000 in seed money from the malaria institute at macha, a partner-ship of the Zambian government, Johns Hopkins university of Baltimore, and the nonprofit macha mission Hospital—plus funding from individuals. today, Linknet has 44 institutional subscribers, including companies, schools, hospitals, reli-gious missions, and social organizations, that pay $30 per month for any village resident to have access to the shared connection.
“When i arrived six years ago, there were five computers in the entire village,” van stam says.
“now we have hundreds of them. We’re trying to duplicate that in 10 other villages in Zambia. After that, we hope to expand to 200 sites.”
it was van stam’s interest in radio transmission and long-distance communication that led him to attend Hogeschool utrecht university of Applied sciences, in the netherlands, where he earned a degree in telecommunications, specializing in
radio and antenna technologies. After graduating in 1989, he worked as a strategist for nozema, the netherlands’ terrestrial broadcast system. When nozema became part of KPn telecom, the coun-try’s largest telecommunications operator, van stam got involved in the company’s expansion into Belgium and south Africa, and he developed relationships with African telecom companies.
during that time, his wife, Janneke, was working toward a degree in tropical medicine. Anticipating a move in 2000 to india for her work, van stam left KPn in 1998 to set up his own tele-com services company, Privacom, which enabled him to work from home. He developed internet and gsm communication services that earned his company an award from the 2001 gsm Forum. Later that year, Janneke’s work took them from india to rural Zimbabwe, where van stam set up an internet café for the community. in 2003, her work took them to macha.
“most of what is necessary for development—water, power, electricity, transportation, and edu-cation—were not fully in place in macha,” says van stam, who receives no salary from Linknet and lives off his wife’s salary and private dona-tions. “so i used a holistic solution based on what locals wanted first and then helped them build it, using the $50 000 seed money. With that momen-tum we were able to start up an internet connec-tion, a community center, a library, an airport, a primary school, and a radio station, among other projects.” the airport, a nearly two-kilometer-long landing strip for small bush planes, is run by a three-person staff.
ieee heard of van stam’s work through Adrian Pais, the Zambian-born, netherlands-based 2009 chair of ieee goLd, who visited macha and saw van stam in action. Pais and van stam, with others, wrote of their work in Bringing Internet Connectivity to Rural Zambia Using a Collaborative Approach for the 2007 ieee/Acm (Association for computing machinery) international conference on information. Van stam, who joined ieee last year, is now vice chair of ieee’s Zambia section and travels the world giving presentations about applying sustainable technology in rural areas.
COMMunitY-CEntErED Western businesses could take a cue from what he has learned in macha, he says: “Africans place a high premium on relationships and the community—instead of on individuals, as they do in the West. new tech-nology has to benefit everyone, not just one group at the expense of another. that way everybody moves forward, not just a happy few.”
Having seen macha’s progress, the dutch gov-ernment this year pledged $3 million over three years to Linknet to expand its coverage and pro-grams into other Zambian communities. Part of the money is earmarked for establishing engi-neering bachelor’s and master’s degree pro-grams at the university of Zambia’s satellite campus in macha. n
Gertjan van stamMacha’s Link to the World Thanks to this ieee member, people in rural parts of Zambia now have internet access BY SUSAN KARLIN
www.ieee.org/theinstitute
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14 The insTiTuTe June 2009
6p.Profile2009.lo.indd 14 5/6/09 2:39:12 PM
We‘re still lookingfor the fi nal frontier.
www.ieee125.org
The sky is never the limit for IEEE members. From yesterday’s Mercury missions, to today’s
satellite constellations, to tomorrow’s landing on Mars, we’re bringing expertise and innovation
where no one has gone before.
In fact, IEEE members have been part of nearly every major technical development of the last
125 years. So when you need to draw on the most advanced technical knowledge on Earth,
or anywhere else, you’ll see that IEEE members aren’t just waiting for the future, they’re
E V ERY FEW MONTHS, t he ballroom at the Marriott Park Ridge, in New Jersey, turns into a concert hall. That’s
when the Variable Speed Band—VSB to its fans—delivers a four-hour con-cert of cover songs from the Beatles, Bruce Springsteen, the Grateful Dead, Eric Clapton, Tom Petty, and other rock icons. The musicians include engineers and product and marketing managers from Sony Electronics Broadcast & Business Solutions Co., located next to the hotel in Park Ridge.
Two IEEE members are integral parts of the five-member VSB: bass-ist Glenn Govier [left] and guitarist/vocalist Peter DiIorio [right]. The two New Yorkers have been play-ing music together since engineer-ing school in the early 1980s. The VSB’s jams, which have occurred intermittently since 1993, serve as a creative outlet and source of cor-porate camaraderie.
“We’ve created a thriving musi-
cians’ community at work,” Govier says. “We’re getting folks out to play who at one time might have played casually and now want to dust off their guitar or bass.” The group sometimes plays backup for friends who are just starting their own band.
“Some people at the company have told me we have changed their lives,” DiIorio says. “We’ve gotten our bosses involved by having them jam with us, and we’ve done a num-ber of business events where we’ve been the featured entertainment.” Those gigs include corporate func-tions, including Take Your Kids to Work Day, and sales meetings involv-ing thousands of Sony employees.
VSB competed in the Fortune mag-azine 2005 Corporate Band Challenge and was invited to perform at the 2006 Summer National Association of Music Merchants pre–trade show party in Austin, Texas. The party fea-tures amateur musicians from the sponsors and attendees.
Last yea r VSB per for med as part of a three-hour, 13-band con-cert Govier and DiIorio organized for a Sony sales meeting in Palm Deser t, Ca l i f. ; recorded a song on the John Lennon Educational Tour Bus, a nonprofit mobile stu-dio started by fans to commemo-rate Lennon and teach children to create audio and video media; and organized and headlined the Rockers Against Hunger charity event in Clifton, N.J.
HOUSE BAND VSB’s stage antics and eclectic repertoire have won enthusiastic support from Sony employees who regard them as the company’s house band. VSB unof-f icia l ly began when Gov ier and another col league jammed at a 1991 Sony regional sales meeting to break up the litany of presentations. It slowly grew in size and stature as word spread around the depart-ments. But its seeds were sewn a dozen years earlier through IEEE.
Peter DiIorio & Glenn Govier Sony Rock Stars
16 THE INSTITUTE JUNE 2009
FRIENDS SINCE chi ldhood, IEEE Members Janice Rock and Joel Booth have led nearly parallel lives.
They grew up 20 minutes apart, near Birmingham, Ala. Both attended the University of Alabama in Huntsville, volun-teered at the National Weather Service, and earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in
electrical engineering—all at the same time. They now work as civilian elec-
tronics engineers at the U.S. Army’s Redstone Arsenal, in Huntsville. And, in another notable coinci-dence, they survived brushes with cancer at nearly the same age.
So when Rock [left], 41, asked Booth [right], 35, to be her figure-
skating partner four years ago, it seemed perfectly natural. No matter that Rock had been skating and competing since age 17 and Booth had tried it only a handful of times.
“Janice was a big inf luence on my pick-ing up skating, because she had done it for many years,” Booth says. “We needed to add physical activity to our lives of sitting at a desk all day.” For the past four years, the two friends have performed as a pair represent-ing the Point Mallard Figure Skating Club in Decatur, Ala., picking up numerous gold and silver medals in regional tournaments around the southeastern United States.
“He’s a natural, and he works really hard,” Rock says. “They call Joel ‘Air Joel’ because his jumps are so high.” Rock is known for what’s called an outside spread eagle: glid-ing on both feet with toes pointing in oppo-site directions.
The pair is working on a Zorro routine. “Joel is wearing a cape and mask, and I’m making a dress that’s a little risqué, to say the least,” Rock says.
“Skating is a great contrast from sit-ting at a desk or working in a lab,” Booth says. Rock adds, “We’re not competing at an Olympic level by any means, but it’s an awful lot of fun.”
It takes a lot of dedication. The pair prac-tices 10 to 15 hours a week for two to three months in order to hone a two- to three-minute routine for a competition.
And skating doesn’t come cheap. Custom
Joel Booth & Janice Rock Skate Mates
electrical engineering—all at the same time. They now work as civilian elec-
tronics engineers at the U.S. Army’s Redstone Arsenal, in Huntsville. And, in another notable coinci-
cancer at nearly the same age.
Booth [right], 35, to be her figure-skating partner four years ago, it seemed
PASSIONFigure skating
PROFESSIONElectronics engineers
HOMETOWNHuntsville,
Ala.
6p.part-timePassions.lo.indd 16 5/8/09 1:36:30 PM
Govier and DiIorio—who grew up in Manhattan and Yonkers, N.Y., respectively, met through the IEEE student branch at the Polytechnic Institute of New York (now the Polytechnic Institute of New York University), in Brooklyn. Both were putting themselves through electri-cal engineering classes as “wiring jocks,” maintaining audio e qu ipment at s e ver a l New York City recording studios. They crossed paths with the likes of Joan Jett, the Ramones, Talking Heads, Barry Ma n i low, a nd Keit h R icha rds. Gov ier, who now lives in Bronxville, N.Y., and DiIorio, who lives once again in nearby Yonkers, began playing in bands in their early teens while also discovering the joys of taking apart appliances to see how they worked.
“I took my passion for engineer-ing and kept it aligned with music by redirecting it to something accept-able to my dad,” DiIorio says. “He felt music was something you did only in your spare time.”
“About 10 years ago,” Govier says, “I realized I probably could have done music on a full-time basis. But it was a good thing I didn’t, because it’s really tough to make it as a pro.
The cats who play in the studios and on Broadway are the best of the best. But playing nightclubs, weddings, bar mitzvahs, and one’s own music is rough work. Musicians aren’t well paid, and many of my professional musician friends are really strug-gling. Engineering work is more guaranteed and more satisfying.”
After graduation, Govier a nd DiIor io bot h went
into TV system design engineering and proj-ect management. Their career paths diverged until they both ended
up, coincidenta l ly, at Sony. They became best
friends performing together in an ’80s rock cover band, the
Odds, that played in New York City.Although VSB now performs for
the public occasionally (“Getting musicians together is like herding cats,” DiIorio says), the group reli-giously adheres to a weekly three hour–plus practice, despite having to balance work and family life.
“It’s remarkable we’ve managed to do it as long as we have,” DiIorio says.
“Somehow, it just works,” Govier adds. “It clicks.”
Check out VSB at http://www.myspace.com/variablespeedband.
—Susan Karlin
www.ieee.org/theinstitute
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skates run US $1500 to $2000; rink time and private coaching cost $600 to $800 a month; and costumes go for as much as $300 apiece. Despite the expenses, the two say they couldn’t imagine life without their hobby.
“Skating is so much a part of who we are,” Rock says—which might help explain their willingness to accept their share of bumps and bruises along the way. A tumble last summer knocked Rock cold and sent her to the hospital with a severe concussion.
“I don’t want to do that again,” she says, laughing it off. “But part of skating is learning how to fall.”
SURVIVORS Rock moved from one dead-end job to another before mel-anoma derailed her at 26. She beat the 50-percent odds and enrolled in college at the same time as Booth. He was diagnosed with testicular cancer at 25, and he earned a clean bill of health three years ago.
“You really change your outlook on life. You don’t let little things get to you as much,” Rock says of their battles with cancer. “The fact that we both are cancer survivors
solidifi ed our friendship.”W h i le at t he Un iver sit y of
Alabama, both got involved in ama-teur radio emergency communica-tions with a storm responders group at the National Weather Service in Birmingham. Noting their enthu-siasm and facility with radio, the meteorologists encouraged them to pursue electrical engineering. They took that advice and joined the uni-versity’s IEEE student branch.
Math equations f it regularly into their practices. “Figure skat-ing is about angular momentum,” Rock says. “We analyze tracings on the ice and conduct vector analyses when our spins don’t center.”
When it all clicks, she says, “It’s the most amazing exercise in the world. And being out on the ice as a pair…there’s so much speed. The throws, jumps, and lifts are so power ful. When you’re moving across the ice surface, there’s a feel-ing of freedom and fl ying.” —S.K.
TOP
: JOSH
UA
DA
LSIMER
; BO
TTOM
: JOE M
ATU
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If you have an interesting hobby you would like to share, e-mail the editors: [email protected].
jocks,” maintaining audio e qu ipment at s e ver a l
R icha rds. Gov ier, who now lives in Bronxville, N.Y.,
After graduation, Govier a nd DiIor io bot h went
into TV system design engineering and proj-
until they both ended up, coincidenta l ly, at
Sony. They became best friends performing together
PASSIONPlaying
rock ’n’ roll
PROFESSIONMarketing managers
HOMETOWNSBronxville and Yonkers, N.Y.
6p.part-timePassions.lo.indd 17 5/8/09 1:40:25 PM
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